Tour de Tayabas


3 Stages May 30 to June 1, 2014 - Tayabas, Quezon
1st stage - 68K
2nd stage - 100K
3rd stage - 72K



Pot's Birthday Ride

July 1, 2013

How do cycling enthusiasts celebrate their birthday? With a ride of course and the celebrant gets to choose the route. These pics were taken in the eastern part of Lucena City.

Mr. Pot Pot in the middle

Yep, that's a beach and some cows

After a lake and a sea, here we are at the river

And a there's always food... lots of food

Swimming Pool Start

For those of you wondering how a swimming pool start of a triathlon or aquathlon looks like here goes one from Wetshop beginners tri.

An Expensive Ride

Bike rides are supposed to be cheap, right? Just bring some water and 200 pesos and you're good, right? Well sometimes you need more than 200 when you happen to chance upon a bike shop or want to try more than a tapsilog or pancit on ride stops. But this one never entered my mind and it's quite an expensive ride.




triathlon philippines
A wooden gazebo for a garden project by my buddy - bought on a whim

My friend Pong saw a wooden furniture maker beside the highway and we stopped over to see their stuff. I immediately fell in love with the sofa set made of 'maulawin' an endangered wood specie and he had his eyes on a gazebo that's a perfect fit for his garden project - needless to say we had it delivered to our address after some haggling. 



bike ride
A excellently built 'maulawin' set is hard to pass at a right price

Run United 2 2013

June 2, 2013

Mall of Asia

Hydration Stations:  Excellent. There were enough for the whole 32K. Well manned with plenty of water and gatorade, some stations have bananas.

 Route:  Flat and a bit boring with Macapagal Boulevard and Roxas Boulevard as the main streets used. Well lit even in places that were supposed to be dark the organizers provided generator sets for lighting.

 Cheering:  It started too early and I never bothered to wake up my family in our hotel room.

 Traffic Management: From my point of view it was superb.

 Kilometer Markers:  Markers on every kilometer.

 Marshals: There were enough at every key areas, even security personnel.

 Singlet:  Better than most.

Medal: Excellent

 Freebies:  Unilab Products. Photo booth. Game booths. Concert.

 Injuries:  None, fortunately.

The Bad:  The start is a bit too early for my taste. 


Run United 2









view from my hotel room beside MOA: I think that building is Solaire

Look Who's On The Cover!

No it's not me, Swim PH's April Cover girl is my pool lane mate Tintin. Don't know how old she is right now but I saw her swam 800 meters in 10 plus minutes when she was 12. Sound fast? Wait til you see her swim her favorite stroke, the butterfly.



Triathlon Swimming
My mate on lane 4

Swim PH cover
On the cover of April 2013 issue

XTERRA Mud Run

draft by camille


May 26, 2013
Filinvest



triathlon Philippines
BANG!!!

A helping hand: nice and dirty


trail run
Running on single tracks

Bottleneck at the rope


XTERRA obstacle course
Spiral Crawl at kilometer 5


XTERRA Mud Run
Extremely muddy and happy

Shower and shampoo

DJ Karen tidying up

Ride to Zig Zag

Using our mountain bikes, we climbed up to Quezon National Forest Park aka zig zag aka eMe. There were four of us riding our mtb's, a pair of 26ers and a pair of 29ers in celebration of my friend Zaldy's birthday. It was a 60 kilometer chillax ride to the top of the mountain where we had breakfast.

Triathlon Philippines
Zaldy taking a walk: he's such a newbie :)

Bike ride to Quezon National Forest Park
My bike on a cliff

mtb cycling
One last pose before we descend... burrp

Off Road Duathlon at Hacienda Escudero

May 5, 2013
3.5K-22K-3.5K

For starter, this didn't turn out well. My first attempt at off road racing was a bit of a failure right from the start. Two days before the event I went to the venue for track reading. A fellow named Hermie generously guided me through the track. It was a mix of lots of trail under the coconut trees and some paved roads of an empty subdivision. The trail was flat with turns all over the place and the grass slows the wheel down substantially. I wasn't doing well that day but I already expected that since I'm riding with tires suited for hard pack concrete like roads. I knew I had to use a different set of rubbers and there lies the problem, I didn't change them so I was doomed right from the get go.



Off Road Duathlon at Hacienda Escudero
Early enough to bike through the run route before gun start

The first run started out well, I reached kilometer 1 in less than 4 minutes and second to go inside the transition area. The run course was approximately 3.5 kilometers and only 35 percent of it was off road and is flat as any pancake's bottom.

Then came the bike leg and with 60 psi of inflation I was bouncing hard on the track. Coupled with my lack of skills on trail riding, or biking in general, needless to say the 22 kilometer ride went slow. And as if that's not enough I encountered two more problems first with my rear derailleur so I had to stop and fix it and second by getting lost in the lagoon portion of the track. By this time I was just enjoying my ride and hoping to finish with a smile on my face as the brutality of off road biking put a toll on my butt and triceps. Maybe a 60 kilometer road bike course is easier than this. My speed was definitely 3 times less than my road bike average.



Green Planet Duathlon
Obviously I won't be stepping on this in the near future

As I entered the transition area to prepare for the second run there were more than 15 bikes already hanging on the bamboo poles. I was able to overtake 5 or 6 runners on my way to the finish line and placed 11th overall out of less than 40 participants.

Would I do this again? Maybe yes if the participants remain few. I don't think I would enjoy it this much if there were more than a hundred of us battling it out on the trails. Trail riding could easily be dangerous if there are a lot of overtaking but the allure of mountain biking will always be there. Off road racing is too technical you just can't spend time on a trainer and hope everything will be fine.



triathlon philippines
Somewhere in San Pablo City

After the race we went to a resort and spa nearby and enjoyed the rest of the day with good food and massage. Ah... Life is good!
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